


The Prince of Aquitaine before his Ruined Tower

by verbaepulchellae



Category: Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: M/M, Mythology - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-03-03
Updated: 2012-03-03
Packaged: 2017-11-01 01:46:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,403
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/350615
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/verbaepulchellae/pseuds/verbaepulchellae
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A grief stricken John returns to the sea, a dubious Sherlock vows to bring him back.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Prince of Aquitaine before his Ruined Tower

**Author's Note:**

> Prompted on the Sherlock kink meme: Selkie!John and Sherlock on an epic quest to bring him back.

Mrs. Hudson hasn’t rented out the flat since John left. When Sherlock comes back, a layer of dust muffles his steps. Everything is as it should have been. There is his chair, still facing inward toward the little tea table. His violin is resting where he left it, propped up against the window. His skull is still sitting on the mantle, his chemistry set is still in the kitchen. On the little tea table, there still sits the last cup he used. Everything is as it should be, but it isn’t. John’s things are nowhere to be found. 

When Sherlock walks up the steps to John’s bedroom, the slightest touch sets the door ajar, and it swings open on squeaky hinges. There mattress is still on the bed, but the drawers of the bureau are empty and when Sherlock checks the closet, there is one, forlorn coat hanger. Sherlock stands in the empty room a long time, a dark statue in the middle of hospital white. He sits on the stripped bed and pulls out his phone. He thumbs through his most recent texts, ranging from his reappearance in London two weeks ago. 

I’m back in London. Three years is a long time, want to grab Chinese? SH.

I understand you are upset, but ignoring me is childish. SH

I won’t apologize for my actions, John, I was protecting you. SH

I’m sorry. Let’s talk. SH

Please, John. SH

Mycroft can’t find him, Mrs. Hudson has no idea where he’s gone and every past girlfriend that John had seen during his time at 221B has slammed the door in Sherlock’s face. So there’s only one person left to see. Sherlock wraps himself in his coat and sleeps on John’s bed that night. He pretends he can still smell John, but the sent has long since faded. 

*

In the morning, Sherlock hails a taxi to take him to Waterloo Station, and from there catches the first train he can to Leicester. He never asked John much about Harry, but there can only be so many Harriet Watsons in Leicester. Turns out there are twenty. Sherlock frowns at his phone and then presses the back button very hard and holds it until his phone turns off. He tents his fingers in front of his face and stares at the back of the seat in front of him until they reach Leicester.

Harriet Watson, sister of John Watson, owner of two cats and a guinea pig, aspiring writer and new girlfriend to a chain smoking blonde opens the door of the seventh house that Sherlock calls upon. She looks him up and down while shielding her eyes against the sun.

“Can I help you?” She asks.

“My name is Sherlock Holmes, I’m a friend of your brother’s.”

Harry stares at him, a frown tugging her lips down. “No you aren’t. Sherlock Homes died three years ago.”

“Technically I faked my own death using drugs and a very clever team of doctors, but to the public world, I was dead until about two weeks ago.” Harry continues to frown at him.

Sherlock sighs. “Listen, I’m looking for John. He’s been avoiding me, and no one in London knows where he is.” He catches a flicker in her face and feels his breath catch. “But you do. You know where he is. Is he here? No, of course he’s not here, John would never live with you, but he caved, didn’t he? He came to you for help. So you must know something. Tell me where John is.”

Harry hesitates and then sighs. “You really are him? This Sherlock fellow? I don’t have to tell you, you did a number of John.”

“Yes, yes I know. Faking my own death for three years can do that to people. Will you or will you not tell me where John is?”

“What do you want with him?” Harry demands suddenly. “Why do you care so much as to try to hunt him down three years later without even a simple clue as to let him think you might be alive? What right do you have?”

Sherlock looks at her hard. “Because it was for his own protection. Because if I had let him in on it, John would have had a bullet in his brain not five minutes later. Because I… because John is different, and I need to find him.”

Harry looks like she might cry, and bites her lip. “Oh, oh John, you fool,” she murmurs. “You’d best come in, Sherlock. We should talk, and I… I have several of John’s things.”

Sherlock stares at her, hard. It’s the type of stare he used to use on witnesses, daring them to correct him. “John isn’t dead,” he says simply. 

“No, Sherlock, he isn’t. But you’re not going to find him. Come in, please. This isn’t a conversation I’d like to have on my doorstep.”

Sherlock relents and follows Harry into her small home. It’s fine, less cramped with things than Baker Street, but smaller. There’s a white couch in the living room and Harry waves his vaguely to sit on it, telling him she’ll join him in a minute. Sherlock sits and glances at the small table to his right, on which several photographs are framed. The first is of Harry and a tall, pretty woman with dark chestnut hair. The picture must be several years old, and Sherlock judges the woman to be Clara. She looks kind, he thinks, the type of woman John would like. 

There’s another picture of John and Harry, in their early twenties, Harry with an arm wrapped around John’s neck grinning slightly dazedly at the camera and John looking exasperated but affectionately at Harry. It’s a nice picture, Sherlock thinks. John used to wear that expression around him, once. Sherlock stares at the picture a long moment and then looks at the third and final picture.

It’s black and white, and a young couple stands in the middle, bluffs and sea surrounding them in the background. The man is tall and handsome, darker in coloring than Harry or John, but the nose and mouth are the same as Harry’s and his ears are shaped like John’s. The woman next to him is small in his arms, she has silvery blonde hair, light against the darker background and she’s looking at the camera with a mixed expression of happiness and longing. Her smile, though fainter than the man’s next to her, is so very John-like that it takes Sherlock’s breath away. He sits staring at Mr. and Mrs. Watson until Harry comes back in, delicately carrying a box that has the look of having been in storage for a very long time. 

“Yeah,” she says as she notes Sherlock’s attention, “My mum and dad. Nice looking aren’t they? Their two year anniversary, back in Stromness where they met.”

“Your mother’s home,” Sherlock says.

“Yeah, in a matter of speaking.” Harry sits down next to him and opens the box carefully. There’s an oilskin in the box, which Harry gently folds back and reveals a sleek, silvery material underneath it. When Sherlock reaches out to touch it, it’s smooth and slightly leathery underneath it.

“Seal skin?” He asks, already knowing he’s correct.

“In a matter of speaking. It’s mine, actually. My skin,” Harry says all in a rush, face turning slightly red. “My mom had one, so did John.“ She looks at him, a strange mixture of bashfulness and defiance in her eyes, as if daring Sherlock to correct her. He raises one eyebrow.

“Are you suggesting that your mother was a Selkie, Harriet?”

“I’m not suggesting. I’m saying,” Harry has a tone of voice Sherlock knows all to well from John, and the determined, steely expression that settles over her features warns Sherlock not to interrupt. This much he has learnt from John.

“My father met my mother when he was 25, on a vacation with mates to Stromness. He, umm, he stole her sealskin, brought her back to London with him. After that trip,” Harry gestures at the photograph, “Mum never wanted to go back to the Orkney Islands. Anyway, John found her seal skin when he was eight, poking around in the attic of the house. He showed it to Mum, and I just remember her crying for three days straight. Then she left.”

“It could have been unrelated Harry,” Sherlock says, as gently as he can. He can’t risk angering her, he’s realized, she is his only link to John at this point. 

Harry shakes her head. “John and I are Selkies- technically half, I suppose, but Selkie none the less. I just think it’s sad to go to the seashore, but John likes it. Used to go whenever he needed to think, said it made things clearer.”

“Harry, where is John now?” Sherlock asks.

“He showed up, about six months back. When Dad died, I got all the old things since John was at war. He asked for his skin. I tried to persuade him not to go, you have to understand that, but John didn’t want to hear it.”

“And where did he go?”

“Stromness. I think he was going home.”

Sherlock takes his leave of Harry baffled but excited. Her story might not make sense but this is the first time anyone has known anything of John. Before he goes, she presses John’s dead mobile into his hand. Says she doesn’t want it anymore. Sherlock looks at it briefly and then tucks it into his pocket. When he leaves, Harry is still on the coach, running her fingers over the silvery sealskin, a faraway look in her eyes.

He texts, I’m on my way to Stromness. I’m going to find you. SH even though John’s phone is in his pocket.

*

From Leicester, Sherlock catches a train to Nuneaton, It’s late, nearly 10 pm, and he spends the hour of 11 to 12 crouched on a bench, a cup of tasteless coffee in his hands as he thinks. He throws it away when the train to Crewe pulls in, and spends a sleepless hour staring at his reflection in the dark window. The train from Crewe to Iverness is delayed and Sherlock paces the platform in the early hours of the morning. It’s beginning to rain, and the only other traveler on the platform is a woman crying into her mobile.

Sherlock finally pulls into Thurso at 2 in the afternoon the next day. He has stubble and his clothes are rumpled from a sleepless train ride. He catches a taxi and spends the brief trip to the ferry station staring at the sparse green landscape. The air is so fresh and sharp with the smell of the sea that it wakes Sherlock more than his 10 am cup of tea did. 

On the ferry, Sherlock finds himself nodding off, so he curls up on a bench on the deck and lets his eyes close. He dreams that John is waiting for him when the ferry docks, that he punches Sherlock in the jaw and then pulls him into a kiss. And then John says, “Would you fancy some fish and chips?” and in front of Sherlock’s eyes he grows a scaly fish tail, pulls on a novelty seal cap and leaps into the sea.

Sherlock wakes, jarred, as a voice over the loudspeaker announces they’ll be docking. He pulls his coat tighter around him, adjusts his coat and joins the swirling mob of tourists that spill out of the ferry. John isn’t there to greet him, and Sherlock pretends he isn’t disappointed. 

Stromness looks like a Medieval city, although it’s not quite that old. As Sherlock wanders through the stone buildings, he muses that it may be a pretty town, but would be much too dull to really settle down in; little crime and a small population to analysis, but if John likes it here… If John likes it here he could consult by Skype. Or perhaps travel down to London or even Edinburgh or Glasgow during the week. It’s an odd thing to think about, living in a small town, but… but. Sherlock thinks he could do it.

He first checks the local clinic, but the friendly doctor on duty has never heard of John Watson. Sherlock inquires about other hospitals and clinics in the area. The doctor tells him the closest ones are in Thurso and Kirkwall. Sherlock thanks him and meanders back out onto the street. It’s getting close to dinner time, so Sherlock searches his phone for all the Chinese, Indian and Thai places and visits them one by one, lingering for a few minutes outside as he glances through the big windows. He gets himself a curry at a decent looking Indian place, partly because he hasn’t eaten anything in 36 hours and partly because he thinks John would like him to eat something.

He checks into a local Inn around 9 pm. It’s a family owned place, on the outskirts of town. As the receptionist labeled Jenny by her brass nametag checks him in, Sherlock glances at the spread of tourist pamphlets and then looks again. Among the other slightly creased pamphlets advertising day trips to Kirkwall and bird watching opportunities, is a slightly faded one offering a Heritage walks with local Folk Lore Specialist Gavin McCrowly There’s a gruff, heavy-set man smiling grudgingly at the camera, a cap pulled low on his brow and hands shoved into his pockets. Behind him… Sherlock is sure it’s the same bluffs that were behind Mr. and Mrs. Watson in the photograph at Harry’s house. 

“Here you are, you’re in room 12, just down that hall,” Jenny says cheerfully as she hands Sherlock his key. Noticing the pamphlet she smiles. “Oh, Mr. McCrowly. He’s an odd fellow, but he has the greatest stories. Loved them when I was a girl, myself. You know, you’re the second fellow to take an interest in that recently.”

“Do you remember who the other was?” Sherlock asks, his heart giving a little skip in his chest.

“I do. Awfully nice gentleman. Sorta shortish, but solid, you know? He asked me to book a tour for him with Mr. McCrowly… oh, I think it was about five or six months back.” Jenny leans forward and smiles at Sherlock. “He said he quite liked the tour, if that’s any help to you.”

Sherlock fishes into his pocket and pulls out a dog-eared photo of him and John, snapped one night when John had persuaded him to come out to a bar. He shows it to Jenny and she smiles. “Ah yes, that’s him.”

“Do you have any idea where he went after he was here?” Sherlock asks, “He didn’t mention he was headed anywhere?”

Jenny scrunches her nose up as she thinks. “No, I don’t think so. He stayed here just one night, I think. You know, the only thing he had with him was this old wooden box, small-like. I remember that. Yeah, I booked him the tour, and I remember him coming back afterward to pick up that box and saying how much he enjoyed the stay and such. Is everything all right? He’s not missing or in trouble is he? He seemed like such a nice man.”

“No need to worry,” Sherlock says briskly as he tucks his photo back into his pocket, “I’m going to find him.”

*

Jenny books him a tour with McCrowly for the next evening and Sherlock meets him at the Stromness Hotel. Gavin looks no different from his picture, complete with the low cap and jacket. Mr. McCrowly is brusque but more or less friendly. As they begin to walk out of town, Sherlock gently steers the conversation toward John.

“Can you remember this man? You took him on a tour a couple months back.” He shows Mr. McCrowly the picture and his guide nods and hands the photo back.

“Aye, I remember him. John, right? Yeah, nice fellow. He had a reall interest in Selkie lore. Fascinating stuff. He seemed quite informed already, had all the basics down, but he was especially curious about Selkies returning to the sea and the like.”

Sherlock frowns. “Did he say why?”

“No, not really. He just seemed quite keen on it, you know. So I told him what I knew, from the different legends and such. And then he asked about my brochure. Wanted to know where I took the picture, said he had a family picture just like it back home.”

“Did you tell him?” Sherlock asks.

“Oh aye, I told him it was over at Billia Coo. Pretty spot. A lot of local legends concerning Selkies come from that spot, so I took him to see it.” Gavin gives Sherlock a long look. “He your boyfriend or something?”

“No,” Sherlock says, “I haven’t seen him in three years. I’m trying to find him. Do you think, do you think you could take me to Billia Coo?”

Mr. McCrowly agrees readily and he ushers Sherlock into his old jeep. It’s not a long drive to Billia Coo from downtown Stromness, the whole trip takes only twenty minutes, but they leave all signs of the city behind and enter the lush coast. Gavin recounts more of what he remembers telling John, and Sherlock listens with only a small part of his brain; the rest is lost in thought.

 

Billia Croo is blustery but beautiful. It’s a sheltered inlet, a flat beach with bluffs rising on either point. Sherlock walks right up to the sea and stares at the waves lapping gently at the sand. The wind whips up his coat and rips his scarf out and tosses it playfully about it his head. Sherlock tugs it back down and arrests its movement in his fist. Gavin trudges up next to him and frowns at the water. “Tell me how it works,” Sherlock says suddenly, “in the legends. How do they turn back into seals?”

“Oh, it’s not too hard to understand, really. They wrap the sealskin around ‘em, snug like, and just wade in. It’s a sight to see, I can assure you. As the water touches them, it’s like the sealskin binds to their skin, just closes up around them. No seam, no odds and ends. Just wraps ‘em up warm and safe and back they go.” Mr. McCrowly has a wistful look in his eyes as he stares at the sea. “Oh, look out there, Mr. Holmes, It’s like they know we’re talking about them.”

Sherlock follows his guide’s finger to the bobbing heads in the waves. For a moment, he believes them human; they’re the right size and shape. But sure enough, as a few more heads pop up, they were seals. For a while, the pod of seals seem content to sit in the water and watch the two figures on shore and then one dives back down and the others followed. Sherlock felt an odd ach in his chest as the seals disappeared and he turned away, studying the sand at his feet.

“To summon a Selkie,” Mr. McCrowly says, unprompted, “you’re supposed to shed seven tears into the sea. But they like songs too. Sometimes, I take my boat into the sea, and I just sing to ‘em, the seals.”

“I don’t sing much,” Sherlock says.

*

 

Mr. McCrowly takes Sherlock back into Stromness and despite Sherlock’s insistence, buys Sherlock a beer at the local pub. “It’s not a thing,” he mutters, “you booked three hours and only got two. Besides, I like Billia Croo.”

Sherlock plays a little with the label of his beer, a habit he had picked up from John and is quiet. Mr. McCrowly says nothing, just sits with him and nurses his own beer. “That John fellow,” he says at last, “he means something to you, don’t he?”

Sherlock purses his lips. “He’s my best friend. I need to find him.”

McCrowly humphs quietly, and nods, as if he knew it all along.

“Mr. McCrowly,” Sherlock says suddenly, “this is a rather… odd question, but do you actually believe in this folklore? Do you actually believe it’s true?”

His companion is silent for a moment, considering him, and Sherlock returns the gaze from under the heavy eyebrows as steadily as he can. Finally, McCrowly coughs and tugs a bit on his scraggly beard. “You know, I get that question a lot, Mr. Holmes. I give one answer to some and another to others. But you know what, Mr. Holmes? I’m going to tell you the truth. Not just the truth about what I believe, but the Lord’s truth. Why? Because I think you need to know it.”

“You’re going to tell me that it’s all true,” Sherlock says, somewhat bitterly. “All this nonsense about shape shifting humans and ancient creatures that summon storms and shed their skins and walk on land like people.”

“You’re a man of science, Mr. Holmes. One can tell that just by looking at you. You don’t like a mystery you can’t solve.”

“You’re wrong. There is no mystery I can’t solve, because everything has a logical order of things, everything has a clear answer, I just have to sift the facts and put them in the right light.”

“Sure, sure. Modern things and the like. But these things, these creatures go a long way back, further than the good Lord goes back, if that’s not blasphemy to say. Sometimes, you can’t get clear-cut answers; you can’t explain the how or the why. You just got to let things be.”

“What, and shed seven tears into the sea and hope John swims up?”

“Aye.”

“Don’t be ridiculous.” Sherlock snaps and he pushes back from the table. “Damn the Selkies and their legends, John is somewhere out there and I have to find him. I need to find him; can’t anybody see that? I need John back, and I’m done wasting time on old wives tales.”

“You’d best start looking in the sea then, Mr. Holmes, because you won’t find John on land, no matter where you look.” Gavin fishes into his pocket and pulls out a tattered card. He hands it to Sherlock. “Give me a call tomorrow, and I’ll pick you up at Jenny’s. We’ll go back to Billia Croo and take my boat out.” Upon seeing Sherlock’s frozen glare, McCrowly sighs. 

“What’s a day more, Mr. Holmes? Tell me this isn’t the strongest lead you’ve had on your John, and I’ll say no more.”

“Fine. Tomorrow.”

*

McCrowly picks Sherlock up at 10 the next morning, the jeep towing an old rowboat behind it. Sherlock makes note of the deeply faded wood, it’s old, spent a lot of time in the ocean and hasn’t been patched up for some time. He climbs into the jeep and responds to McCrowly’s grunt of welcome with his own hummed response. The sun is bright as they drive west along the coast and it’s pleasantly warm for an autumn day. Sherlock again thinks he might bring John back here after he finds him, the peace and tranquility of the place would help them reconnect, work through the worst of it all. He knows, deep down, things won’t be easy. 

If John’s this far gone, there’s a chance their friendship won’t ever be the same, but Sherlock hates the weird feeling he gets in his stomach when he thinks about that, so instead he thinks on how John would drag him to the beach on warmer days, with hopes of making sandcastles and enjoying the sun before the winter closed in around them. Sherlock would make a show of not wanting to get his hands dirty, but once John poured a bucket of water over him and pulled him down into the sand, laughing, they would make the most elaborate sand castle complete with gardens and a dungeon for Moriarty and maybe a holding cell for Mycroft. 

Sherlock hasn’t realized he’s closed his eyes until McCrowly stops the jeep and touches shoulder.

“We’re here, Mr. Holmes.” Sherlock opens his eyes slowly. Billia Croo sits before him, green and blue and grey, and Sherlock suddenly feels as if John were very close by. He hurriedly gets out of the car and hungrily searches the beach for signs of anyone nearby. There’s no one, not even any new foot prints, besides his own and McCrowly’s from yesterday. He turns back to McCrowly and finds the man looking at him.

“Can you feel it?” McCrowly asks.

“Feel what?” Sherlock snaps.

“There are Selkie nearby. People who love Selkie can always sense them,” McCrowly says as he begins untying his boat.

“Feelings don’t mean anything,” Sherlock sneers quietly, “Feelings are nothing more than chemical reactions in the brain and body. They can’t tell you anything but your own internal workings.”

“If you say so Mr. Holmes. Help me drag this boat down to the water.”

Fifteen minutes later, McCrowly is pulling heavily at the oars and they’re zipping away from land. Sherlock clasps his hands over his knees and studies the water. Soon enough, McCrowly gives up rowing and tosses a make shift anchor over the side of the boat. “We’re in shallow enough here that we’ll be safe from the tides, but seals’ll be comfortable swimming here,” he tells Sherlock.

And then he settles himself comfortably and begins to sing quietly. McCrowly has a nice voice, if a little rough, Sherlock thinks absentmindedly, trained as a boy no doubt but gave it up in his late twenties, probably when he left his parish. 

Sherlock listens to the soft singing, something about losing love at sea, and then next to him rises a sleek silver head. And then another. The seals, possibly the same as he saw yesterday, rise out of the water around the boat. They seem curious, both about the noise and the two men in the boat. While they keep a safe distance, they seem to enjoy the music and one in particular swims a little closer to McCrowly, rising further to lay it’s head on the edge of the boat. The man stops singing and stares down at the small seal, a wistful smile on his face. “Here,” he says quietly to Sherlock, “this one here is a Selkie.”

“How can you possibly know that?” Sherlock mutters. 

“The eyes, there’s something more human in them. Maybe more faie is the right word, but I like to think human. And she knows me.” Gavin reaches out slowly and gently strokes the silvery skin on top of the seal’s head. It gives a quiet sigh of pleasure and looks up at McCrowly with large brown eyes. 

Sherlock looks away, uncomfortable for reasons he can’t explain, and as his eyes slide over the other seals he notices one slightly further out than the rest. It seems to sit on the waves, head rising and falling with the movement of the water, and its large, deep eyes are fixed directly on Sherlock. As Sherlock stares back, it drifts closer and Sherlock feels like he’s been stabbed in the gut and all the blood is draining slowly from his stomach, because… because the seal has John’s eyes. Exactly. And that look in them is one of such confusion and emotion that Sherlock can’t help the tears: the tears that haven’t come since he looked down at John from his roof top perch and lied through his teeth. And Sherlock knows, without any shred of proof or justifiable theories, that the seal is John. John is just a few feet away from him, but as Sherlock extends his hand toward the small animal, it dives back down beneath the waves. Sherlock cries out, but it’s too late. His tears fall into the salty sea.

*

Sherlock lingers at Billia Croo long after McCrowly hitches up is boat and returns to Stromness. 

“It’s hard at first,” McCrowly told him, leaning against the side of his jeep, hands tucked into his jacket pockets and starring out to sea, “but you gotta believe that they’re happy, it’s what’s best for them. Can’t I give you a lift back?”

“No, I’ll walk. It’s not that far,” Sherlock had been able to croak out, still scanning the waves for a glimmer of sealskin. McCrowly had shrugged, clambered into his jeep and pulled out. Sherlock realized, as he pulled away, he had never asked for his fee.

Now, with the sun beating down and warming his wool coat and the sand beneath him, Sherlock feels woozy with grief and heat. His eyes burn from staring at the bright water and horizon so he flops backward and closes his eyes against the light. He falls into a half dream state, in which John is back in 221B, making breakfast and humming an odd lullaby. When Sherlock reaches out to wrap his arms around him, John’s smooth skin is slick and moist and John barks at him and falls into the ocean of their kitchen floor. He looks up, seal eyes wide and angry. “You’ve got a lot of nerve,” John says.

Sherlock opens his eyes, startled. There, dripping wet and wrapped in loose sealskin stands John. Sherlock blinks, once, twice, and the dream doesn’t disappear. He sits up suddenly and stares at John, who stares down, face hard and mouth set.

“You… you think you come back here, after you’ve died and pretend you’re still alive? You think you can… can… Sherlock, why?” And John drops to his knees and muffles a sob in his hands. Sherlock, half elated, half terrified reaches out to draw John to him but John shakes him off angrily. “You’re dead!” He insists, “I watched you drop off a roof. You idiot, you bloody imbecile.”

“It’s me,” Sherlock whispers, and gently touches John’s temple, traces his ear, wet with briny water. “I’m sorry, John. I’m so sorry.”

“Sorry? Sorry?!” John chokes out, “Your sorry that you’re dead and drove me half mad with grief and took everything from me except the ocean? I can’t… I couldn’t go anywhere without seeing you. The humans were all you, all the pavement and grit was you. You were all and everything. Jesus, why are you here?”

Sherlock scrubs a hand in front of his own eyes. “I had to, I had to save you. I didn’t mean for this to happen. I didn’t know.” He grips the sides of John’s head and pulls his face close to his own. “I can’t keep going without you.”

“You managed fine didn’t you? Being dead. God, Midsummer Eve killed me, I’d come to the land and it was SherlockSherlockSherlock, everything. The smells. Your smell. The sea… it’s not like that. It’s clean,” he murmurs, “proper.”

John’s mind is still wrapped up in the sealskin, Sherlock realizes, and he gently runs his hands down to John’s shoulders and nudges to skin off them. It falls to the sand, loosing its shine as it picks up grit. “John. Come back to me,” he says quietly, “I’m here.”

“No, don’t… don’t say that.” John shivers and his eyes seem to clear. “Sherlock? It’s… Oh God.”

John half snarls at him, half laughs and grabs Sherlock, pulls him too tight against his chest. He snuffles at Sherlock’s hairline and presses a shaky kiss to his forehead. “I hate you,” he mutters but his hands are running over Sherlock’s back, gripping his shoulders, smoothing over his face, tracing his cheekbones, just touching, touching, touching. 

“No you don’t.” Sherlock mumbles into the strong shoulder. 

“Why did you do it?” John demands, drawing back and staring Sherlock full in the face. “How did you do it? Why didn’t you tell me?”

“Molly,” Sherlock mutters but can’t bring himself to say more than that, can’t tell John about the three years he crouched in the shadows, hunted and was hunted and always, always thought of John. “I was coming back for you.”

At this, John moans and buries his face in his hands. “Oh Sherlock, too late, you’re too late.”

“Nonsense,” Sherlock says desperately. He pulls John back against him. The sun is setting and John’s skin is covered in gooseflesh. Sherlock rubs his hands against his back and arms trying to warm him. John breathes lightly at the base of his throat. “I’m here now. You’ll come back to me. Back to 221B. It’ll be like it was. It’ll be like it was always meant to be.”

“I don’t… Sherlock, I don’t think I can.” John whispers. “The ocean… I can’t imagine leaving it. It’s everything I need; it’s quiet… I just can’t imagine going back to a city with all the dirt in the air and the noise, the smells. Sherlock, I belong in the ocean.”

“No,” Sherlock snaps suddenly, “that’s just the… the Selkie in you talking. John you belong with me on land. You did it for 38 years, you can do it again.”

John stares up at him with wide eyes. “Sherlock. I haven’t been on land for six months. I don’t know if I even can go back. I don’t know if… if what I am will let me now that I’ve touched water.”

Sherlock slowly let’s go of him and sits back. John crouches in front of him, watching him like a nervous animal. 

“You want to stay here?” Sherlock asks.

“I… I don’t know what I want. I thought you were dead for three years! And suddenly you just show up and expect everything to be like it was.”

“Because it can be!”

“Sherlock, even without this… condition, I don’t know if it ever could be! You can’t just let people think you’re dead and then pop up and say ‘Just kidding, I’m really alive and want you to come back to me.’ Normal people don’t do that, Sherlock! Normal people don’t fake their death and except the people they’ve hurt to still love them when they come back!”

Silence rings loud. John claps his hands over his mouth and rocks on his heels. Sherlock is frozen, his eyes cold and hard.

“You don’t love me anymore?”

“I don’t know, I don’t know.” John whispers. “Do you even love me? Did you ever?”

“Of course!”

“Then how could you do that to me?” John bellows, “How could you leave me in a world without you! Do you know-“ He cuts himself off and takes a breath, and then continues calmly. “Do you know how many times I visited your grave? How many times I tried to move on? How many times I thought it would be easier to kill myself than go on without you?”

Sherlock drops his eyes and stares at the sand. 

“I didn’t think so,” John says evenly. He collapses back into the sand and just looks at Sherlock. “The truth is, Sherlock, I don’t know if I can come back because I don’t know if I could go through it again.”

“You won’t have to,” Sherlock pleads, grasping for John’s hand. “Never again. I promise.”

“The thing is, you can’t promise that. And I… I’m over you. If I come back, it’ll be the worse the next time.”

“Are you happy here?” Sherlock demands.

“It’s quiet here,” John repeats, “And I think I’ve finally learned to accept the quiet.”

*

Sherlock boards the earliest ferry out of Stromness the next morning. He hasn’t slept and doesn’t dare to close his eyes lest he sees John again. He has to wait two hours for the train back to Iverness, and he stands stock still in the middle of the platform until his train pulls in. It’s a blur from Inverness to Edinburgh, Sherlock rests his head against the glass and shuts out all thoughts. He watches the countryside flash by in shades of grey.

When Sherlock get’s back to London nearly a day after he’s left John and Billia Croo, both his body and his head ache. Mycroft is there to pick him up in a shiny black car and Sherlock doesn’t even try to avoid him, just clambers in next to him.

“Was it a fruitful endeavor?” his brother asks silkily.

“If it was, I wouldn’t be in this car,” Sherlock says and then closes his eyes. Mycroft drops him off at Baker Street and Sherlock stands looking up at the flat for five minutes before he goes inside. This time, he doesn’t go to John’s room, he curls up on the couch and tries to convince himself that sleep is pointless.

Lestrade calls him at five the next evening. There’s a been a murder, and he wonders if Sherlock would be so kind as to come have a look at it. The police are baffled. And thus life goes on. 

Sherlock has packed up all his things the fourth day after his return and is the process of moving them downstairs to the moving van when Mrs. Hudson appears at the door. Her hands are all a flutter and she can’t find her voice for a moment.

“Sherlock,” she says, “There’s-“

“I’ll miss you too, Mrs. Hudson,” Sherlock says from the window, “But I simply can’t-“ 

And then John appears in the doorway behind her. He shuffles into the room and stands at attention. Sherlock’s voice is very much gone.

“Well, hello.” John says uncomfortably and shifts his feet.

“I’ll just… I’ll just leave you dears alone.” Mrs. Hudson scurries from the doorway.

“You came back.”

“Oh, very well done, Sherlock, excellent deduction,” John snaps but there’s no malice in it. He touches the box on the chair next to him. “You leaving, then?” he asks in a softer tone.

“I didn’t want to stay here.” Sherlock pulls the last few books down from the shelf and puts them in a box. “It didn’t feel right.”

John takes a breath and then says in a rush, “I realized that I still don’t like the quiet.”

“Well of course, you don’t!” Sherlock scoffs, “I could have told you that.” But seeing John’s face he presses his lips together. “Sorry.”

“I decided that I still don’t like the quiet. And… knowing that you’re alive, I can’t see myself anywhere but at your side.”

Sherlock reaches into his box and pulls out the books. “Fancy some fish and chips?”

John grimaces and begins to unpack Sherlock’s chemistry set. “I think I’ve had enough fish for a life time.”


End file.
